Editorial: Giving equal attention to terrorist attacks in non-Western countries

Last week, the airport bombing in Brussels received international attention and multi-day news coverage from CNN and Fox News. Numerous editorials and commentaries plastered news sites and Facebook news feeds. Indeed, the attacks on Brussels were an outrage and deserved the spotlight they garnered. However, this coverage completely drowned out many other formal terrorist organization attacks that occurred in the days before and after the attack in Belgium. In Turkey, two separate bombings — a car bomb and a suicide attacker — recently took the lives of scores of Turkish citizens, and injured hundreds more. In Nigeria, Boko Haram attacks occurring last Thursday killed 13, the second Boko Haram attack in the country in March alone.

Attacks in Europe and the United States get more media coverage because often, they are perceived to be a more direct threat to those in the West. But we are an international university with international students whose families come from every corner of the world — it is against our aspirations for a better world to be stingy with our care and compassion.

The aftermath of terrorism is just as severe in non-Western countries as in Western countries. Groups like the Taliban, and many civil wars, are all tied to Western imperialist expeditions and scheming. Horrifying violence and deep instability are results shared in the United States and Turkey, Belgium and Nigeria. In Turkey, the implications are a decline in the tourism industry they are economically dependent on. This is in addition to reciprocal violence and government overreach, which threaten serious political repression, and extend all the way to the families who mourn lost lives.

We need to actively pay attention to news stories regarding attacks in these countries and in all non-Western nations. We need to treat them as global tragedies suffered and mourned by everyone. We should not separate the terrorist attacks that are in the West and those that are not, or create a hierarchy of attention. The media is not a monolithic structure that can’t be changed — it has the ability to give voice to everyone.

Finally, the Tufts community also needs to stand with our international students from Turkey, from Nigeria and from all regions of the world struck by terrorism. We at the Daily intend to work to make that happen too. While we may stumble and make mistakes in the process, our intention and desire is fundamental. We must show that we are not putting a price tag on life — that we stand with victims of terror across the world.